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 Posted: Sat Feb 26, 2011 3:26 pm
Manny just couldn't seem to get rid of Marini, but the harder he had tried, the harder she held on .. and the more he decided maybe she should stick around. She'd been there for all of this so far and she was, at least, an optimistic perspective on all of this. She'd let him complain but she always had something nice to say.
"What if we can't find Zi? She looks too much like him for it to be better to just stumble across her without warning," he muttered, "And now that we've invited her to visit so often, it's bound to happen." "Don't worry about that," Marini responded with the exact optimism expected of her now, "Zi is one of the family members that sticks around a lot, isn't he?" If they couldn't find him before tomorrow, he would show up before then. Unless something happened to him or he ran away or something.. but why would he even do that?
"If we can't find him, we'll go hang out with your dad or something until he finds us."
Easy.
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Posted: Sat Feb 26, 2011 3:42 pm
The grey lion heaved a long sigh and shifted his body weight, luckily in the right direction to spot his brother. And Marini. Those two were spending an awful lot of time together, and while Zi was happy for his brother, he was also bummed that he was now the lonely bachelor and Manny was loved. "Hey." He called out to them in a melancholy tone, having given up masking it.
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Posted: Sat Feb 26, 2011 3:51 pm
"Ah! There he is!" Marini spotted Zi first, nudging Manny and nodding towards their target.
"Huh?" he looked up just in time to see Zi looking at them and call out to them, "So he is." They hadn't gotten very far after worrying about not finding him and there he was. It was very convenient.
"Hey, Zi!" he called, picking up the pace and going up to them. He could tell he was still being mopey but he wasn't here to try to cheer him up-- though the tone did make him second guess whether this was a good idea or not. But they had just discussed why he had to find out from them.
"Hello~!" Marini called out in a sing-song voice, encouraged by Zi's sad tone to be especially nice to him, "How are you doing, Zi?" She kept up with Manny as he picked up the pace, smiling kindly at her mate's brother. He really needed to cheer up.
"We were looking for you!"
Feeling wanted was good, right? And it wasn't untrue, they wanted to see him.
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Posted: Sat Feb 26, 2011 4:05 pm
"You guys are cheerful." He pushed himself up from a laying position with his front paws, and stayed in a sloppy sit. His back legs were pushed off to the side instead of neatly folded beneath him. For someone who cared so much about how he looked and posture, this was alarming. He, of course, ignored his pose and stared at his brother and his mate expectantly.
"Well, you've found me. What can I do for you on this... fine day?" He directed his attention to Marini, not wanting to be rude to her. He was fond of her, and despite his jealousy over Manny's happiness, he did find her to be very well matched to him and sweet as could be to the family. It was hard to not like her. And if she was going to be family, there was no reason not to.
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Posted: Sat Feb 26, 2011 4:13 pm
Zi's comment caught Manny off guard and made him wonder just how depressed his brother currently was. Manny was definitely not very cheerful-- though perhaps Marini was cheerful enough for both of them, she generally was.. but this was the worst Manny had seen Zi in a while. He was speechless for the moment, having a hard time finding his voice when Zi was looking at Marini rather than him. He didn't need to speak just yet if Zi was talking to her.
"Yes, it was rather easy," she said, smiling widely at Zi when his attention was on her, "Manny was starting to think we wouldn't be able to find you, but I don't know why." She shook her head. Sometimes he was a little pessimistic.
"We came to tell you about your si-"
"Whoa, wait!"
Manny found his voice just in time, realizing Marini was going to dive right into this conversation rather than find a way to ease into it. He wasn't sure what way was best to go about this but it certainly didn't seem like just saying it was the way to go.
"Marini, just.. let me," he said, frowning.
Marini looked genuinely surprised at being cut off and looked at Manny, though she was far from being offended. She blinked at him and couldn't help but frown a little in response.. but she knew she should have known better.
"Sorry."
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Posted: Sat Feb 26, 2011 4:30 pm
Zi was going to continue on with the niceties, but he was silenced quickly by the exchange. He was surprised Manny had cut Marini off, and he was really curious as to what she was going to say originally. And what Manny seemed to think he should say instead. He stared dumbly at the pair for a moment while they talked. He changed his attention towards his brother, lifting an eyebrow and finally sitting up straight and proper.
"What's going on?" He looked back to Marini, then to Manny. He couldn't possibly imagine what they were going to say to him, but he had an idea it was about the pink lioness. How had they found out about that? Had she not run off after all? Maybe they'd run into her, and she'd said something about it. But why would she do that? His mind was racing a mile a second, but he wasn't even close to the target.
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Posted: Sat Feb 26, 2011 4:39 pm
"Well, uh.."
Manny didn't have any idea how to go about this so he was just going to have to tell Zi what had happened to him. It wasn't a great story but it was something.
"The other day Marini and I were out for a walk when we ran into a little rogue lioness," he started, "She looked a lot like you, actually, that was the first thing I thought when we- when Marini struck up a conversation with her."
Marini alternated between looking at Manny and looking at Zi, nodding when she thought it was appropriate to nod, confirming bits of Manny's story as he went along. She was working hard to keep herself from saying anything now, waiting for Manny to tell the story himself. Eventually she took a seat to listen.
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Posted: Sat Feb 26, 2011 4:51 pm
Zi nodded to show he was following the conversation, but had to wonder. He did not find it at all strange that his brother and his brother's mate would stumble upon a rogue lioness. The Pridelands was not only huge, it was very open, and it was common to bump into lions and other big cats who were not from here. He'd run into his fair share of non-Pridelanders. They'd had family visit from other prides. Why was this weird at all?
And a lioness who liked like him - What could that mean, really? Zi didn't associate his coat with his mother, so Intombi didn't even pop in his mind. He thought at first his father's side of the family. Was Manny trying to tell him they had new cousins? "What's the point here, Manny?" He cocked his head to the side.
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Posted: Sat Feb 26, 2011 4:58 pm
"I'm getting to that," he said, though he didn't know exactly how to proceed without just spitting it out but he was trying to avoid that.
"Well, uh, eventually she noticed that I looked like someone she knew, too," he said, which wasn't exactly how it had happened but had to be the motivation behind asking about his legs, "She asked me where I got the mud markings on my legs.. and I asked her where she got hers."
There. He'd said it.. without saying it.
Marini was looking at Manny like she didn't understand what he was saying. She had been there, that wasn't what happened-- though Liyana had asked about his leg markings, and he about hers. But why was he telling it like that. Still looking a little perplexed, she looked over to Zi to see what he was getting from it.
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Posted: Sat Feb 26, 2011 5:27 pm
At first, Kimbizi still couldn't figure out where his brother was going with this story. He looked to Marini for help, but she seemed just as lost as he did. Now what kind of sense did that make? If she had been there, shouldn't she know what he was talking about? And why was Manny spending so much time tiptoeing around what he was trying to say? Zi was starting to wonder if he really had anything to say at all, and if this was really about the incident with the pink lioness.
"Do we have more cousins or something, Manny?" He stared at him, confused. A cousin could easily look like both Zi and his brother, so he didn't make the leap to sibling. It was so far from his mind, it wasn't even a consideration. "What's going on?" He flicked back his ears, beginning to get a little annoyed.
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Posted: Sat Feb 26, 2011 5:33 pm
When Zi looked over to Marini, Manny couldn't help but follow. He was kind of annoyed to see she didn't seem to be following either but there was something much more important to worry about now. He sighed and looked back at Zi as he started asking the wrong questions.
"No, Zi," he said, deciding to just say it, "She is our sister. Mom had more cubs after she left us. More importantly, they're living somewhere near here. She wasn't old enough to be wandering that far from home."
Marini looked back and forth between the brothers again, pausing on Zi when he focused back on Manny and Manny actually got to the point of their little story.
"She does look a lot like you, Zi," she said, almost like she thought this would make things better, "She's gray and black and blue and everything."
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Posted: Sat Feb 26, 2011 5:43 pm
Kimbizi stared at the pair, dumbfounded. He shook his head slowly and closed his eyes, trying to digest what had just been said. He tried to not think of his mother too often, but here she had been thrown on his thoughts twice in just a few days. And she had cubs? How is that even possible? It didn't occur to Zi that his dad had moved on after their split, but Intombi? She left. Why would she move on. He tried not to think about it, and looked off to the side of one of his front paws. That's when it hit him, what Manny had been saying - of course they both knew someone with those leg marks. Manny was all their mother, except for the blue.
He looked back up at them, glancing from each to the other several times. "We have a sister." He didn't like the way the sentence felt on his tongue. He screwed up his face a little, scrunching up his nose. "Nearby." Even worse. He licked his lips and stared at the ground again. Before looking back up, he said, "And she looks like me." It seemed like he wasn't able to form his own thoughts, and was only taking them from his brother. Then, finally, he made one. "Mom's nearby."
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Posted: Sat Feb 26, 2011 6:15 pm
Marini was the first into action when Zi finally processed the information enough to spit out the realization that their mother was nearby. She had been through this conversation already with Manny, he hadn't been very happy about it so she wasn't sure that Zi would handle it a whole lot better. She was on her feet again and she went over and sat close beside Zi, hoping having someone close would help him, even if she wasn't really a big part of the conversation.
"We have seven more sisters, and a brother," he clarified, his tone almost neutral, he couldn't seem to hide all of the bitterness in it. They had many more siblings, but that wasn't even really the worst part. Zi had already picked up on the worst part.
"Mom knows she found me, too," he said, taking a seat himself, "Liyana had to ask her about me before she figured out what was going on. But I guess mom would know where she was, it's not like you can just forget where you left eight of your kids."
His tone became increasingly bitter as he went on. He was a father now, sometimes he didn't feel like a very good one, but he would never forget about his girls. He would never, ever abandon them, either, and it had been hard being involved where Tzila hadn't wanted any relationship with him.
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